RaveCanada.Net

What is your definition of "art"? What would you consider to be art? Is there any criteria that a painting or drawing must meet for you to consider it so? Would you consider a straight line drawn on canvas with the title "mother" to be art, or a bullshit cash-grab? Is there any particular genre that you absolutely do not consider to be art? What do you think is the greatest form of art (and we're talking painting or drawing, not music)?

I personally think that creating art takes time and talent. I would not consider something a good piece of artwork unless time and forethought went into it. Just slapping some paint on a canvas is not art to me...I do that for my home from time to time, but would never consider selling those pieces because there's no substance to them, they were made to fill wall space and create a nice color flow to each room. They're not worth shit in my mind and if I sold them for money, I would feel kinda slimy.

Please discuss, and remember, there's no right or wrong answer, this is all a matter of opinion...

here's a really good example of something I don't consider to be art, and it's actually hanging in the Museum of Modern Art in New York:

lulz that is not art imo. art needs a little more talent to it than a 2 year old XD

looks like poo

Exactly. Looks like someone took baby diarrhea and spread it around on a piece of paper.

Ok, so other than looking like poo, what are other things that would make you turn away from a painting with the thought "I would never pay money for that"?

i would never pay money for most paintings that would be considered art XD

why not? what about them didn't you like? Was it that they were flat? Was it that you thought you could basically make the same art yourself for 1% of the price the painting was being sold for? If they were too amateurish, what was it about them that made them amateurish to you?

speaking of amateur, i never understood how "Canadian Standards Association" could sell his art, he mustn't have a single drop of modesty in him

with that being said, i would much rather babyshit on newsprint than something that looks like a failed attempt at effort.

if you compare effort to result, this babyshit painting looks like a 1:1 ratio, whereas a typical highschool-esque amateur painting on the better end would have a ratio of 8:5

a boring piece is better than something that tries too hard

I usually like abstract art the best.

I don't care if it's apparently "easy". TBH, I don't give a shit how hard it was to make your painting, if I don't think it looks nice then it's no better than that smeared poo you posted.

Often you'll find some of the most talented painters (when it comes to painting people and impressionist bs) turn around and do crazy abstract stuff, because it's actually more of a challenge. Think Picasso.

"REAL art" is a stupid phrase anyways. Often times, there is no difference between some crap you found on the street and art unless you want to make it art. I think picking garbage up from the street and framing it can be art, and you don't need to be an "artist" in the traditional sense of the word to do it. An artist is a person that does something like "pick garbage up from the street and frames it", to me.

I'll take a babyshit please!!!

there is a lot of thought that went into abstract expressionist paintings. it was revolutionary at the when we started to see abstraction in the turn of the 20th Century. the whole concept of what constitutes painting and its true purpose in the dawn of industrialism was an interesting dilemma at best. with the advent of photography in circa. 1860's worlds fair the whole dialectics around painting changed. how to capture the drama of the soul. that started to be the main focus of painting. when people started to talk about how painting was purely about surface, line, and colour. (i recommend reading clive bell who beautifully sums up the notion of significant form) it was a time when making an abstract painting became a vehicle for social change. it was the first time art became completely democratic. abstraction was the new language that anyone from any class or any country would be able to relate. the emotional response was to come from the actual effects of significant form itself. not the artist or the subject manner, which was completely irrelevant. because painting was just paint on a flat plain.

wether or not it was successful is rather a completely different discussion or wether or not you can engage or connect with these painting is another matter all together.

but if you were alive given the social climate of the day and age and would you make a painting like that? i very much doubt you would. nobody did. thats why they were revolutionary and dangerous. they were a rebellion form the masters and ecole de beaux art and salon system. the idea behind abstract paintings---, cubism, de stijl, constructivism, conceptual art, and abstract expressionism and other modernist abstracted movements i haven't named off the top of my head were politically dangerous. one of the most important art shows showing off the modernist movement would have been hitler's "degenerate art show" i would DIE to see that show. the work that was in it. OMFG. it was oddly enough the most well attended agit-prop show the fascists put on.

i would love to have a discussion on art, but i wont sit by and read a thread of people just trashing abstract art or the modernist movement. they were full of ideas and intent that are very complex and sophisticated. a 2 year old would never be able to create them.

also keep in mind that nieve art isn't the same as abstracted work.

i can tell by the materials used and the control in the painted brush work that this is NOT the work of a child.

oil paints can be dangerously toxic and no responsible parent would give them to a child that would paint something a long these lines.

secondly there is remarkable control in how the artist applied paint to the page.

i can see why one may not connect or engage with this piece. i most certainly don't particularly like it. but i can certainly appreciate what it stands for given the 20 seconds i would give it in a gallery space. (they timed that you know, the average time someone spends with a work of art in a gallery space is 30 seconds) when you engage with a work you would obviously spend more time with it. rothco is an excellent case in point. when i saw his red and orange painting i sat in front of it for probably half an hour and cried. 3.bp.blogspot.com/_Pgeyw5ga_vs/ SbX5JElbl...mark+rothko+1956.png

all i said was it looked like poo, i didn't say i didn't like it

come to think of it. the longest i spent with an art piece in a gallery space in one sitting was about 6 hours in an instillation called "beijing opera" by yin xiuzhen.
it was epic. i visited that show about 3 times in a week for three months especially to see that instillation. it was very simple, but it still haunts my mind being there.

i took everyone i knew to that show. the best thing the VAG put on in my opinion.

VAG?